


though i try to resist, i still want it all.

by divinerenjun



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Closure, M/M, Post-Break Up, Reminiscing, Sad Ending, Unresolved Emotional Tension, references to the osaka vlog, renjun fools cover, renjun is rly going through it, sort of..
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-24
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:35:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25480033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/divinerenjun/pseuds/divinerenjun
Summary: They’re so close to closure, so close to a new beginning, but he’s going to throw it all away for the sake of three little selfish words.“Say it,” Renjun whispers, lips touching the mic, speaker pressed tight against his ear. “Say it one last time.”
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Wong Yuk Hei | Lucas
Comments: 15
Kudos: 61





	though i try to resist, i still want it all.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rare_cat_meme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rare_cat_meme/gifts), [boyfrendery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/boyfrendery/gifts), [hoeunki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoeunki/gifts).



> renjun said fuck

Renjun gets the call exactly four minutes after his cover is posted. He doesn’t pick up on the first ring, or the second, or even the third, and chooses instead to just sit and watch the YouTube view counter creep steadily upwards. 

He’s happy. He’s happy to be finally sharing this with his fans, and he simply does not want that happiness to be crushed any time soon. 

Something deep inside him must love pain though, because on the seventh ring, just before the call would be sent to voicemail, he answers. 

It’s silent for a full thirty seconds. Then, Renjun’s bubble is popped by a single word. 

“Hello.” It crackles through the phone speaker, distorting the voice Renjun knows so well into a mere ghost of itself. His elation dissipates, replaced with a heavy feeling in his chest. 

Renjun doesn’t respond. 

“Renjun, I…” He trails off. Static. Renjun feels his eyes glaze over as he stares at the computer screen, forgetting to blink. 

“Your voice still fits the song perfectly.” 

It’s not what Renjun expected, and he feels like he just slammed face-first into a solid brick wall. An apology, a request for an apology, a simple ‘how are you?’ - anything would have been better than this. He’s sent spiralling, down, down, down, into a solid body beneath his own and a warm neck to press his lips against. He’s assaulted by the memory of humming emotional lyrics into the crook of Yukhei’s shoulder, large hands gripping his waist, a lazy day off in bed, a hazy, rose-tinted filter over the whole scene. 

It makes him want to scream, cry, break things. He opts instead for a simple “Thank you.”

Yukhei sighs. Renjun knows he wants more. He also knows that if he gives Yukhei anything more he’ll end up giving him everything, only to have it all ripped away once again by his own insecurities. He wants to get drunk. 

“Kun said that he’s very proud of you.” Small talk - is this what they’ve been reduced to? Years of pillow talk and fond date night memories gone down the drain, leaving behind awkward pauses and the urge to sprint out of any room they’re left alone in. 

“I know,” Renjun replies. He’s keeping it brief, tucking his cards close to his chest, hoping that Yukhei will either get the hint and hang up or call his bluff and beg for him back.

“Ten is streaming it like a fan,” Yukhei laughs, and Renjun feels the breath knocked out of him. 

“Yeah,” his voice is weak. “He texted me about it.” All caps, a screenshot attached of the view count still in the hundreds, and gushy, gushy praise. Renjun loves Ten desperately. 

And again, silence. Renjun can hear Yukhei breathing, faint but steady, and wonders if his own heartbeat is audible on the other end.

Yukhei starts talking about Bella, and Renjun knows he’s just rambling to fill the space. He saw her the day before, saw how much she’s grown under her fathers’ loving care. He’d watched Lucas lay down on the ground next to her, grab her toy and fight her for it, pulling and pulling with the happiest grin on his face. He’d been _jealous._ After all this time, he was jealous of a fucking dog. His chest aches. He wants to make Lucas smile like that again.

He recalls their first night together. Not sex, just - together. Squeezed into a single twin-sized bed in an Osaka hotel room, trying not to shift around too much so Renjun wouldn’t fall into the crack between their beds. They’d talked in whispers, fingertips brushing, knees bumping, until Yukhei pulled him closer. 

Their confessions had been inaudible, just breath ghosting across the gentle curve of a cheek and doe eyes pooling with nerves, adrenaline, sweet, sweet relief. 

He recalls the months of pining before that night, flushed grins exchanged in the practice room mirrors, gentle teasing on camera, pointed flirting in rooms full of NCT members, begging Sicheng not to leave them alone together out of fear that the illusion of tangibility would be crushed. 

In the end, it wasn’t being alone that broke them. It was the moments together: the heart-racing adrenaline any time they made eye contact, worried that something in their shared gaze had given them away. 

Sparse minutes of snagged solitude eventually wasn’t enough. 

“It wasn’t your fault,” Renjun cuts in. It comes out more harsh than he intends. He can _see_ Yukhei’s parted lips and wide eyes, so earnest and open and loving and - 

“We could have made it work.” Yukhei is insistent, no shock in his voice at the outburst. Renjun closes his eyes, willing down the hope that sparks in his stomach and immediately begins blooming out, weaving ivy strands between his ribcage. Despite it all, despite knowing better, he still wants that future. He still wants Xuxi’s arms around him, holding him close late at night, whispering promises in low tones against his cheek - promises that could never be fulfilled. 

His very bones ache. “We couldn’t have, Xuxi. We’re not meant to be together.” He wants it to hurt, still wants to inflict more pain after all that he’s put Yukhei through. 

That's why they would never work. Yukhei is the sun, spreading warmth and light and life to everything around him. People bask in his presence, revel in the bright rays cast off by his smile and the energy they intake from his kind-hearted words. Renjun won’t sell himself short, he knows people enjoy his company too, but this, this sadistic part of him that still wants Yukhei to be hurt by his words, this is a part of him that he cannot deny. Yukhei does not have a single bad cell in his body. Renjun sang him break-up songs while they were still happy together. They would never work. 

“You don’t know that.” It’s quiet, mumbled. Renjun scoffs, affronted both by the notion that Yukhei thinks they could have made it and by the lack of confidence in Yukhei’s voice. 

Yukhei hears his disdain and repeats himself, stronger this time: “You don’t know that. There’s still a whole future stretching out in front of us. Out of the limelight. Away from all of this.”

Perhaps Yukhei has a bit of sadist in himself as well. 

Renjun gasps out his response. “You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t consider every day what it would be like to be with you again when we’re finished?” He swallows the thorns in his throat. The ivy of hope has creeped from its confines. “You think I don’t miss you?”

“Tell me honestly,” Yukhei’s voice is more demanding than Renjun has ever heard it. “Are you happy that I called?”

Renjun deflates. His shoulders slump and the fight leeches out of his heart. “I nearly keeled over in excitement when I saw your name on my phone screen.” It’s not sarcastic, as much as he tries to imbue the words with insincerity. He knew the pain that was coming, the avalanche of emotion, the sheer tonnage of water that would sweep him off his feet at the breaking of this dam they’ve constructed between themselves, and yet he cannot deny the joy he felt at the sight of the incoming call. 

He misses talking into the night, cradling his phone as close as he could to try and fool himself into thinking Yukhei was there with him instead of miles away across an empty sea. His fingers are white-knuckling his phone for entirely different reasons now. If Yukhei were here with him he doesn't think he would be able to restrain himself from landing a few good punches.

And so he says as much. “I want to punch you,” he breathes out. His voice breaks on the second syllable. 

He can sense Yukhei opening his mouth and hurries to continue, words spilling out in a sticky, gooey mess that leaves his tongue tasting bitter. “You’re probably thinking that you deserve it, and that’s the problem, Yukhei. You don’t. It’s not your fault. It’s…” He bites out the next word, “ _their_ fault.” Yukhei knows who he’s referring to. “It’s _my_ fault. I couldn’t take it anymore. Lucas I wanted you _so badly_ that I couldn’t have you and that doesn’t even make sense to me anymore.”

Renjun falls back against his pillow, trying to find patterns in the plaster ceiling. “I still want you.” He figures he’s on a roll. Why stop now? “I still want you but I can’t have you so what does that make me? What does that make me when I’m the one who ended it but I’m here teasing you with hope?”

“Renjun, stop. It’s not your -”

“Explain to me why we aren’t even friends anymore, Xuxi.” 

The line is quiet for a minute. The aircon kicks on, filling Renjun’s room with a gentle hum. They’re a building apart - just a few hundred feet as always, and yet Yukhei seems closer than he ever has in the past year. 

“I’m always here for you, Renjun. I thought it would be better for us to stay apart. Maybe I was wrong.”

Renjun gives in, resolve crumbling at Yukhei’s gentle intonation. Gives in and allows himself one question, one bullet to end it all, one dagger in his cold, cold heart. “Say it,” he whispers, lips touching the mic, speaker pressed tight against his ear. “Say it one last time.”

It’s not fair. In no way is what he’s asking fair to either of them. They’re so close to closure, so close to a new beginning, but he’s going to throw it all away for the sake of three little selfish words. 

Yukhei indulges him, as he always has, as he always will. 

“I love you, Renjun.” 

They’ll see each other ten times in the next week and each encounter will be just as horrible as the last thousand have been. They’ll avoid each other’s eyes, Renjun will mumble his greeting, and Yukhei will plaster on a smile that doesn’t quite make the corners of his eyes crinkle like they used to. They’ll see each other a hundred times in the next month, and each time they pass in the halls Renjun will sidle as close to the wall as he can get. Each time Mark mentions Yukhei’s name, Renjun will feel his lips move with the ghost of the response he doesn’t give now. 

He hangs up the phone. 

**Author's Note:**

> i love pain. renjun fools cover soty. 
> 
> also shhhh i know that renjun was being showered in love and praise and affection from all the dreamies when the cover was uploaded but pretend with me that he got like 20 minutes to cry about his ex before they all ran in and gave him a big group hug. thank you. much love.
> 
> kudos and comments are always appreciated (especially if they are talking about renjun saying fuck)! 
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/divinerenjun) | [cc](https://curiouscat.me/divinerenjun)


End file.
